1708 Crestwood Drive
Contractor J.J. Jamison built both this residence and 1706 Crestwood in 1937 for the Rustin family, several years after most of the other homes on this block. The Hollowell family, who were the early developers of Hollywood, sold the lots to Wallace Daniel and Katherine Charlotte Rustin. Wallace Rustin served as president of Rustin Furniture Company, overseeing its growth from a small, 5,000-square-foot store in 1935 to more than 20,000 feet of space in the Bouchier Building at 1720 Main Street by 1941. Like other wealthy families in Columbia, the Rustins employed African American men and women for live-in work, including domestic tasks and manual labor, although their identities are not always known. Instead, evidence often exists in the form of newspaper advertisements in The State, such as the one the Rustins placed in 1938 for a “capable colored girl” to “live on premises.”
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1708 Crestwood Drive, 2019. Historic Columbia collection.
